Automation is not just a hype or a fad. It is here to stay, but maybe not in the sci-fi version that is often propagated. We believe the future is digital enablement where intelligent automation and AI-powered advanced assistant systems will empower humans in doing activities more efficiently and productively. This will be the case especially in the world of work.
How Does the Future Look?
Before we look at how digital enablement helps the world of work over simple automation, we think a comparison with the automobile industry will be helpful. This is because the way enterprises are adopting technology is similar to the rise of intelligent automation in the automobile industry.
The automobile industry has seen a rise in investments and ideation around autonomous vehicles. Several startups are working on software. Technology giants such as Google and Tesla are innovating. Traditional OEMs are transforming themselves. Companies like Volkswagen are investing in software for improved driver safety and car performance.
Despite all the hype surrounding autonomous cars and taxis, there is still a long way to go before we get there. However, we simply cannot ignore the fact that the automobile industry has seen massive disruptions, especially in the way cars are made and used now and in the next 10-15 years.
Cars today have access to software-driven components worth USD 600 from almost zero 10-15 years back alongside a sea of advanced features. The industry made great strides in leveraging technology to improve the standards of safety, performance and entertainment. Software components in the form of advanced driver assistance systems are adding great value in improving safety and driver experience.
Advanced driver assistance systems are a combination of technologies that compute sensors and cameras attached across your vehicle. They come together to a single system to deliver different controls to the software that can be managed from an app. Ultimately, the advanced driver assistance system becomes intelligent by learning, for instance, when to brake and ride, manage cruise control, etc. If the driver falls asleep on the wheel, this system will help you be alert. These advanced driver assistance systems are powering the evolution of autonomous cars. In the future, we will have mature systems with software and hardware components together forming a coherent and cohesive system.
Enterprises have been adopting cognitive technologies for a few years now but the past couple of years have fast-tracked it. What is truly path-breaking is the deployment of AI-powered digital assistant systems. These are multiple connected technologies that create digital twins/ workforce to assist users (employees and customers). The list of technologies that enterprises use to create advanced digital assistant systems include Intelligent Automation, Robotic Process Automation, AI, computer vision, document processing, NLP, integrated workflows (most important) and self-learning capabilities, among others. They enhance customer and employee experiences while driving operational efficiency.
Similar to cars that have sensors and cameras observing and learning all the time, these connected set of technologies form an advanced worker assistance system. The software centers observe how you work, offering suggestions and insights for improvement while accelerating productivity. They automatically learn how work is done and processes are done and perform at scale. This is the future!
Why is Digital Enablement Important? Why Not Just Automation?
Remote work is now becoming the norm and hybrid work is the future! Thanks to the disruptions triggered by the global pandemic, there have been accelerated digital adoption across organizations like never before. As per the World Economic Forum Report, 54% of the existing workforce needs immediate digital rescaling.
And advanced worker systems are redefining work. Regardless of how they are called (automation, intelligent automation, low/ no code or connected advanced worker systems), enterprises are embracing technology coming together to augment their human workforce. Through the adoption of this technology, enterprises are putting themselves on a path to an autonomous workforce that is resilient and agile. In a way, you are future-proofing your enterprise by adopting advanced worker assistant systems.
Digital Enablement through AI-powered digital assistant systems is enabling businesses to achieve the scale that disjunct task automation misses. There couldn’t be a stronger case for digital enablement over simply automating certain workflows or using disconnected sets of software and technology.
The Challenges in The Adoption of Only Automation
We have been adopting automation in the form of bots/ software that take over repetitive, manual or data-intensive tasks from humans. These initiatives are being scaled too. However, they are not intelligent. Even in H1 2021, not more than 10% companies have done anything intelligent with automation at scale. The journey to making them intelligent is challenging too.
Leaders driving intelligent automation initiatives typically invest in technologies such as Robotic Process Automation, local notepad applications and so on. But making it accessible to intended users is the most critical part of adoption. There is an explosion of low-code and no-code platforms. However, users need to spend time making 8-10 apps even to automate one standard task. Local apps are exploding, requiring users to keep learning how to use them. For this, they require assistance. This is creating digital fatigue for the end users.
One of the other major challenges is the technical debt that is created even as we adopt technologies. For instance, if the enterprise is purchasing RPA software, then the leader looking after the digital initiatives will have looked at 50-100 vendors. The amount of time, money and effort spent on this process will be 3X-5X the cost of the software itself. Given how rapidly systems and processes change, you will be playing catch up with the pace of digital transformation to maintain automation. This further increases the cost of automation, further creating a misleading KPI. You may have saved human hours and costs, but the technical debt would far exceed any savings.
Addressing The Challenges and Deriving Value from Digital Enablement
Organizations need to focus on creating an agile, change-ready digital workforce to drive revenues, operational efficiencies and organizational agility. Between automation and assistance, employees need to be digital enabled to perform work. They need to gain assistance, insights, feedback and skill suggestions for complex tasks which only they can perform while other repetitive, data-intensive tasks are automated. Advanced worker assistance systems play a critical role in doing so.
Companies are struggling to achieve scale while deploying solutions because they start with automation thinking and not enablement thinking. They need to change mindsets and define KPIs to report from a value benefit point of view. KPIs need to talk about the number of digitally enabled employees, additional skills learnt, hours saved on mundane routine tasks, employees’ ability to focus on complex problems, inefficiencies addressed, improvements in discipline and so on.
The self-learning, autonomous digital assistant must be self-learning and must augment employees with skills recommendations. Most importantly, the time to market must be fast. Adopting a cloud native approach enables enterprises to start the journey instantly without waiting for months to roll out to the automation project. Choose a solution with deployment options across public, private or hybrid clouds.
Leaders buying technology need to look beyond the partner’s promises and the pricing. The last thing organizations need is to add a bunch of siloed technologies. They need to find systems that are relevant to the business. The technology must be easy to execute as simple as email or tools like Zoom. They need to be accessible across platforms and channels. They must be affordable to everyone in the organization. It should be natural language driven so that the digital assistant can engage like any human colleague/ assistant naturally would across channels. Put differently, find systems that can achieve digital enablement, and actually democratize assistance and automation in your organization.
The digital assistant system can be governed, secured, monitored and managed by the CEO and the IT teams of the enterprise. But to truly democratize automation and assistance, the employees need to decide which tasks to automate and how to automate. The leaders and the IT team must bring together existing technology and give everyone access to the assistance system, allowing them to design the automation workflows.
An IT-in-the-loop needs to be adopted where employees are not dependent on IT to help with automation. For this reason, everything from process discovery to learning and automation of skills, the entire process must take a no-code approach. IT should secure, govern, monitor and manage automated/ self-service systems, run product in the cloud architecture, systems maintenance, take care of the infrastructure side, etc.
On the execution front, the advanced worker assistance system must integrate seamlessly with all business apps being used such as Salesforce, CRM, ERP tools, human capital management systems, etc. Further, the chosen digital enablement solution must offer end-users with in-app, contextual analytics and insights to help employees use the technology better. Enterprises need to focus on improving the adoption of technologies they have already invested on. Improved adoption = Improved ROI.
To start getting better ROI, you must have a closed loop feedback system to learn the work side of things. The technology system must provide analysis, suggestions and next best actions in real-time to people. It is critical. Or else, you are just executing technology, not learning from it.
When assistance, automation and analysis come together, you are empowering your workforce. They will start approaching work differently.
The Bottomline
Enterprises achieve greater cost and process efficiencies when technology is given to every user in their hands. If you start putting autonomous thinking and solutions into your initial organization, you can see real dollar benefits in less than 12 months.
A key metric going forward would be how many users are digitally enabled. You must achieve 100%. Just like everyone has email, collaborative tools, Zoom, etc. Similarly, everyone must have access to an AI-powered, self-learning, natural-language digital assistant as a given, without being exclusionary or expensive. Start digital enablement by augmenting employees to become superhumans with advanced worker assistant systems today to push boundaries on what you can achieve and prepare yourself for the future of work!